Regional variation in exam level and academic standard ?
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Mike Edwards
Guest with no name who is a teacher.
If teachers were as succesful in preparing children for GCSEs as tutors are in preparing children for the 11+ our education system would be much better. (personal opinion)
Why, I may wonder, do so many parents choose to send their children to private tutors?
Maybe they disagree with the politics of some teachers that actively seek to prevent selection on ability at any stage of a childs education.
The only areas of the 11+ or any entrance examinations that would require children to perform at near 100% is within the independant sector or where there is a small number of grammar schools within the LEA.
Lets face up to facts teachers only need to teach children to attain a mark of 48-52% to achieve a 'C' grade in GCSE mathematics (depending on the examination board). Teachers fail miserably to attain this target and in many schools across the country more than 50% of pupils do not achieve a 'C' grade.
But, of course, teachers have so many excuses, other than their own failings, to explain away the facts.
Many able students who are exposed to a comprehensive education system fail to attain their potential within the secondary schools. Many people believe, that they achieved higher qualifications later in life in spite of the comprehensive education they received rather than because of it.
The comprehensive education system simply does not work on an academic level, so scrap it.
If teachers were as succesful in preparing children for GCSEs as tutors are in preparing children for the 11+ our education system would be much better. (personal opinion)
Why, I may wonder, do so many parents choose to send their children to private tutors?
Maybe they disagree with the politics of some teachers that actively seek to prevent selection on ability at any stage of a childs education.
The only areas of the 11+ or any entrance examinations that would require children to perform at near 100% is within the independant sector or where there is a small number of grammar schools within the LEA.
Lets face up to facts teachers only need to teach children to attain a mark of 48-52% to achieve a 'C' grade in GCSE mathematics (depending on the examination board). Teachers fail miserably to attain this target and in many schools across the country more than 50% of pupils do not achieve a 'C' grade.
But, of course, teachers have so many excuses, other than their own failings, to explain away the facts.
Many able students who are exposed to a comprehensive education system fail to attain their potential within the secondary schools. Many people believe, that they achieved higher qualifications later in life in spite of the comprehensive education they received rather than because of it.
The comprehensive education system simply does not work on an academic level, so scrap it.
Dear Mel
80/82% - where do these figures come from?
Re John Hampden, refer to the following [ page 14]
http://www.bucksscc.gov.uk/schools/documents/a" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ... idance.pdf
Bucks do not allocate highest score downwards anymore, much fairer I think
Good luck for allocation day I am sure you will be OK.
Patricia
80/82% - where do these figures come from?
Re John Hampden, refer to the following [ page 14]
http://www.bucksscc.gov.uk/schools/documents/a" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; ... idance.pdf
Bucks do not allocate highest score downwards anymore, much fairer I think
Good luck for allocation day I am sure you will be OK.
Patricia
Last edited by patricia on Fri Mar 31, 2006 4:19 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Mike Edwards
Catherine
Yes I definitely agree with you.
The problem with private tutoring is that it is completely unregulated and individual tutors adopt their own quality standards. The advantage to parents is if they are not happy with the standards of a tutor they can remove the child and find another tutor.
Teachers, on the other hand, are regulated quite vigorously by OFSTED that is why a number of schools have been placed under special measures because of poor performance. It is the teaching staff that create the poor performance not the pupils, parents, socio-economic conditions etc. Parents do not have the choice to remove children from poor performing schools, nor do they have the choice as to who teaches their child.
Regards
Mike
Yes I definitely agree with you.
The problem with private tutoring is that it is completely unregulated and individual tutors adopt their own quality standards. The advantage to parents is if they are not happy with the standards of a tutor they can remove the child and find another tutor.
Teachers, on the other hand, are regulated quite vigorously by OFSTED that is why a number of schools have been placed under special measures because of poor performance. It is the teaching staff that create the poor performance not the pupils, parents, socio-economic conditions etc. Parents do not have the choice to remove children from poor performing schools, nor do they have the choice as to who teaches their child.
Regards
Mike
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puzzled
re. your debate on percentage required to pass
Well I had also thought that one needed to answer over 80% of the questions correctly in order to pass the 11+. But let me state some statistics from last year e-mailed to me by the headteacher of one of the hardest grammar schools to get into in Kent.
He said that last year, to get a score of 140 one had to have at least 75% of the answers right (more correct answers required of an older child, a few less required of a younger child).
(He did indicate that last year was atypical in some way - presumably the papers were harder so raw scores were lower. But because of the way standardisation is carried out this does not affect the fact that the top score is 140 and the pass score floats around 120.)
So if this is the case, the percentage of correct answers that was required to pass last year, was quite a bit lower than 75%, and nowhere near 86%.
To give some background, in the area in Kent where the 11+ operates, one is required to be in the top 25% of the population (I presume the UK population) to pass. Some schools require much higher marks than others e.g. the one I am referring to normally requires at least 137 out of 140 in all three papers (maths, non-verbal reasoning, and verbal reasoning). So one could pass but not get a place at the grammar school of one's choice.
I wish that people would explain the interesting points that they make in some of these threads in more detail. e.g. please can Patricia explain how individual schools looking at answer grids completed by their pupils can work out the raw score pass mark for that year. This would surely require that before posting off the answer sheets, someone in school would have to work their way through the papers to work out the correct answers, then mark all the answer sheets and make a note of what each pupil achieved. (or are they allowed to photocopy the question papers and the children's answer sheets?) Then when the results came out they would have to compare each child's raw scores as marked in school with the standardised score issued by the examining board and hazard an educated guess as to where the pass/fail border lies.
Do enough schools really go to this much trouble to establish with accuracy that the raw passmark is 86% of answers correct? And even if they did this ithe notion of a set taw score passmakr seems flawed as it would be very hard to set papers each year where a raw score of exactly 86% represented the 25th percentile. Papers would surely vary in difficulty and the standardised score allows for this, but the raw score passmark would surely vary quite a bit from year to year depending on the questions.
This must be true of all public exams - the raw pass mark floats from year to year depending on the difficulty of the paper.
He said that last year, to get a score of 140 one had to have at least 75% of the answers right (more correct answers required of an older child, a few less required of a younger child).
(He did indicate that last year was atypical in some way - presumably the papers were harder so raw scores were lower. But because of the way standardisation is carried out this does not affect the fact that the top score is 140 and the pass score floats around 120.)
So if this is the case, the percentage of correct answers that was required to pass last year, was quite a bit lower than 75%, and nowhere near 86%.
To give some background, in the area in Kent where the 11+ operates, one is required to be in the top 25% of the population (I presume the UK population) to pass. Some schools require much higher marks than others e.g. the one I am referring to normally requires at least 137 out of 140 in all three papers (maths, non-verbal reasoning, and verbal reasoning). So one could pass but not get a place at the grammar school of one's choice.
I wish that people would explain the interesting points that they make in some of these threads in more detail. e.g. please can Patricia explain how individual schools looking at answer grids completed by their pupils can work out the raw score pass mark for that year. This would surely require that before posting off the answer sheets, someone in school would have to work their way through the papers to work out the correct answers, then mark all the answer sheets and make a note of what each pupil achieved. (or are they allowed to photocopy the question papers and the children's answer sheets?) Then when the results came out they would have to compare each child's raw scores as marked in school with the standardised score issued by the examining board and hazard an educated guess as to where the pass/fail border lies.
Do enough schools really go to this much trouble to establish with accuracy that the raw passmark is 86% of answers correct? And even if they did this ithe notion of a set taw score passmakr seems flawed as it would be very hard to set papers each year where a raw score of exactly 86% represented the 25th percentile. Papers would surely vary in difficulty and the standardised score allows for this, but the raw score passmark would surely vary quite a bit from year to year depending on the questions.
This must be true of all public exams - the raw pass mark floats from year to year depending on the difficulty of the paper.
Dear Puzzled
I do keep saying 86% is NOT an exact figure its a very rough guide. Yes I have seen teachers marking the tests. No they shouldn't photocopy them.
One verbal reasoning test is very quickly answered by an experienced teacher. Not all schools will do this, it will of course be denied. Its just a very rough estimate, over the years the going rate has been in the region of 86%. Yes it will vary, for reasons that have already been explained/
Parents /tutors need to know approx what to be aiming for.
Note your comments about Kent, Bucks is different. The individual LEA/schools choose what is the pass mark, Nfer do the rest.
Patricia
I do keep saying 86% is NOT an exact figure its a very rough guide. Yes I have seen teachers marking the tests. No they shouldn't photocopy them.
One verbal reasoning test is very quickly answered by an experienced teacher. Not all schools will do this, it will of course be denied. Its just a very rough estimate, over the years the going rate has been in the region of 86%. Yes it will vary, for reasons that have already been explained/
Parents /tutors need to know approx what to be aiming for.
Note your comments about Kent, Bucks is different. The individual LEA/schools choose what is the pass mark, Nfer do the rest.
Patricia
